There’s an art to how one should go about breakups. And I nominate Gen Z for the prize for best artist. From reposting Jaun Elia tweets to pick-me thirst traps on Instagram stories, social displays of my generation’s bad breakups can be described as tacky. But they are still less embarrassing than trad wife reels on love and devotion. Relationships are breaking like biscuits because we don’t stick around until things get soggy. Give us some credit, we are working hard to get the divorce rate down—by simply avoiding getting there.
There are four kinds of breakups. The ego bruiser, the heartbreaker, the liberator and one that is all three rolled into one. None of them are fun. Some soldiers take several rewatches of Pride and Prejudice (2005) to recover; some bawl with Ranbir Kapoor singing Channa Mereya on repeat, and others go into the dark place by bingeing BoJack Horseman (2014). Eventually, they all get back on Hinge. And of course, nothing keeps the gyms running like breakups.
Some dating influencers are pretty strict about the steps to break up, to keep things nice and respectful for both parties. No contact for 21 days to build a healthy habit, journaling twice a day to dump feelings, reconnecting with nature and whatnot. The same people make videos on ‘How to Get Your Ex Back’ but we are not supposed to get ideas from it. For the love doctor, the road to recovery is paved with bullet points and generic hashtags.
On ‘How To Break Up’, the advice is to always do it in person. But here’s the riddle—imagine if two people haven’t met each other in person even once in their relationship. It can hardly get more melodramatic than a Zoom exit interview of ‘It’s not you, it’s me’. When things get awkward, you can always freeze your face on the screen and blame Jio Fibre for the abrupt goodbye.
The final gasp of a mediocre relationship
A 20-something couple, who was actually in a two-year relationship like this, didn’t end things with a snap. The ice had become so thin that the guy once texted, “I am going to eat pani puri, don’t break up over this.” Like many relationships, this one also ended after several mini-breakups. The dude in Kollam moved on immediately with someone in his college so the girl in Bengaluru didn’t have to feel guilty about hurting him. They didn’t even have pictures together to purge from each other’s Instagram accounts. Their relationship started on Facebook and became it—irrelevant.
If you think that nothing can be more Gen Z than a breakup like this, let me raise you another. This one also happened in Bengaluru, and very predictably, a start-up was born from it.
The girl, now an entrepreneur, was open to co-parenting their kitten but the guy wanted nothing to do with it. She channelled all the anger from the breakup into making her sustainable papier-mâché brand go viral – each pot and pendant had a special theme about him. He might have won the breakup, but in terms of social clout, she made sure he was the loser.
And let’s not forget the subtler forms of revenge—one woman goes around town passing her ex’s contact number in feedback forms to random restaurants, cash counters, and marketing people. At least he can feel like that somebody wants him, so what if it’s spammers? From start-up success to social media dominance, it’s clear that breakups can spark more than just emotional turmoil.
In most cases, what feels like the end of the world is really just the final gasp of a mediocre relationship. It’s time for a personal reboot—glow up, if you will—and a ceremonial “new beginnings” photo dump.
Views are personal.
(Edited by Zoya Bhatti)